Once again: is it really "Islamophobia" to point out that Islam, unlike all the major forms of Christianity, has a comprehensive system for the governance of a state and the ordering of a society, and that many Muslims believe that that system must be implemented wherever possible? The Dutch PM says that "the decision on whether to open EU membership talks with Turkey, due to be taken in December, must be strictly on the basis of whether or not Turkey meets the agreed standards of human rights and democracy." Fine; but why can't there be on that basis a forthright discussion of whether Islamic law itself meets those standards?
Yes, Turkey is a secular state, but it is a secular state under constant pressure from radical Muslims, to whom over the years it has granted significant concessions. What form will those concessions take in the future?
Apparently the Dutch PM assumes that Islam is just another species of "religion," i.e., like the Calvinism and Roman Catholicism that the Dutch used to believe in. Neither one challenged the character of the state, at least in modern times; why should Islam? He shows no awareness of the likelihood that many European Muslims want to create Sharia states there, or of other key elements of the Turkey EU question. From the BBC, with thanks to Joe Kraft and Sharon:
Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende has said Islamophobia must not affect the possibility of Turkey's entry to the European Union.Speaking at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, he attacked Muslim groups, which he said were sowing hatred, and promised new anti-terror measures.
Mr Balkenende was outlining the plans of the Dutch presidency of the European Union over the next six months.
The newly enlarged parliament is meeting for the first time this week.
BBC European affairs correspondent William Horsley says Mr Balkenende's comments were unusually harsh and blunt from a European head of government, especially one who speaks for the whole EU.
Same criteria
The Dutch prime minister said Turkey's possible entry into the EU troubled many European citizens.
But he said the decision on whether to open EU membership talks with Turkey, due to be taken in December, must be strictly on the basis of whether or not Turkey meets the agreed standards of human rights and democracy.
There was not a problem that Turkey was a Muslim nation, he said.
"The decision must be arrived at honestly, under the ground rules to which we previously, in 2002, firmly committed ourselves," he said.
"That means strict application of the criteria laid down, but without inventing new criteria.
"We must not allow ourselves to be guided by fear, for example of Islam."
He said the problem was the misuse of religion to sow hatred and to repress women.
It also should be asked forthrightly whether the sowing of hatred and repression of women are really "misuses" of Islam, considering passages of the Qur'an such as 98:6, 9:29-30, 48:29, 4:34, etc. etc. Is this very question "Islamophobic"? Why must it be? Why cannot there be an open acknowledgement by secular and moderate Muslims that they do not live with these assumptions about unbelievers and women, and that they do not believe that such texts are the words of God?
Yes, they would be portrayed as apostates. Yes, they would be in fear of their lives. And this is why we see no large-scale reform in Islam.
The admission of Turkey would not only permit 80 million Muslims from Turkey, by no means all of them enthuiastic secularists, to move freely about all the countries of the EU, and to establish even more mosques, madrasas, add their voices to the swelling demands from the Muslims already established, and making demands on Infidel governments, all over the countries of Western Europe. It would also make easier the flow of other, non-Turkish Muslims from Syria, Iraq, and indeed everywhere in the Middle East, for whom slipping into Bulgaria, and then Rumania, and Austria, and Germany, and Italy, and France, and Spain and every other hapless country in the EU -- including the Netherlands, which is already suffering from what this Dutch Prime Minister wishes devoutly to believe is just one more "religion" in no way less pliant, in no way less tolerant, in no way more threatening to the way of life and assumptions of Western civilization, in no way more threatening to the physical security of its citizens, in no way more threatening to the art treasures -- the statues of Rome, and Florence,and Paris, the paintings in the Prado, the Louvre, the Alte Pinakothek, and of course the Rijksmuseum, with all those pictures that are absolutely contrary, in their exaltation of human figures and faces, to the tenets of Islam, as expressed in the best-selling Halal-Haram guide of Qaradawi. Perhaps the Dutch PM thinks the Muslims of Turkey, and all the millions of other Muslims whose way will be eased, paved even, by the Turks, simply drop their Qur'ans at the door, and magically become little Dutchmen, little Frenchmen, little Italians. He should look around. That is not what anyone of sense is reporting.
The official policy of the American government remains support for Turkey's entry into the EU. This official policy is based on the silly belief that Kemalism is as strong as ever (it is not), and that Kemalism is here to stay (it is not, for Islam is a far stronger impulse than Kemalism, which weakens among Turkish communities outside of Turkey, that became far more fervent Muslims when the power of the Turkist state to enforce Kemalist strictures no longer hovers over them).
One assumes that Europeans have not gone completely crazy, and that those countries -- such as Bulgaria, with memories of Ottoman rule and the devshirme -- not to mention the power of another totalitarian ideology, Soviet Communism -- will prevent those hellbent on the collective suicide of what is still, despite everything, a civilization worth saving. It does have powers of recuperation; perhaps those powers will re-appear in time. Just.
There are some who argue Turkey would be a buffer
zone:Bush himself urges EEC to accept Turkey's bid
for Membership.Think that if there are any more
atrocities by Al Quaeda between now and December the answer will certainly be 'NO'.